Connect to RSS Feeds as an External Data Source using PolyBase

PolyBase for SQL Server allows you to query external data by using the same Transact-SQL syntax used to query a database table. When paired with the CData ODBC Driver for RSS, you get access to your RSS feeds directly alongside your SQL Server data. This article describes creating an external data source and external tables to grant access to live RSS feeds using T-SQL queries.

NOTE: PolyBase is only available on SQL Server 19 and above.

CData Connect AI provides a pure SQL Server interface for RSS, allowing you to query data from RSS without replicating the data to a natively supported database. Using optimized data processing out of the box, CData Connect AI pushes all supported SQL operations (filters, JOINs, etc.) directly to RSS, leveraging server-side processing to return the requested RSS feeds quickly.

Configure RSS Connectivity for PolyBase

Connectivity to RSS from PolyBase is made possible through CData Connect AI. To work with RSS feeds from PolyBase, we start by creating and configuring a RSS connection.

1. Log into Connect AI, click Sources, and then click Add Connection

2. Select "RSS" from the Add Connection panel

3. Enter the necessary authentication properties to connect to RSS.

   You can connect to RSS and Atom feeds, as well as feeds with custom extensions. To connect to a feed, set the URL property. You can also access secure feeds. A variety of authentication mechanisms are supported. See the help documentation for details.

   
4. Click Save & Test
5. Navigate to the Permissions tab in the Add RSS Connection page and update the User-based permissions.

Add a Personal Access Token

When connecting to Connect AI through the REST API, the OData API, or the Virtual SQL Server, a Personal Access Token (PAT) is used to authenticate the connection to Connect AI. It is best practice to create a separate PAT for each service to maintain granularity of access.

1. Click on the Gear icon () at the top right of the Connect AI app to open the settings page.
2. On the Settings page, go to the Access Tokens section and click Create PAT.
3. Give the PAT a name and click Create.
4. The personal access token is only visible at creation, so be sure to copy it and store it securely for future use.

With the connection configured and a PAT generated, you are ready to connect to RSS feeds from Polybase.

Create an External Data Source for RSS Feeds

After configuring the connection, you need to create a credential database for the external data source.

Creating a Credential Database

Execute the following SQL command to create credentials for the external data source connected to RSS feeds.

NOTE: Set IDENTITY to your Connect AI username and set SECRET to your Personal Access Token.

CREATE DATABASE SCOPED CREDENTIAL ConnectCloudCredentials
WITH IDENTITY = 'yourusername', SECRET = 'yourPAT';

Create an External Data Source for RSS

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE SQL command to create an external data source for RSS with PolyBase:

CREATE EXTERNAL DATA SOURCE ConnectCloudInstance
WITH ( 
  LOCATION = 'sqlserver://tds.cdata.com:14333',
  PUSHDOWN = ON,
  CREDENTIAL = ConnectCloudCredentials
);

Create External Tables for RSS

After creating the external data source, use CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE statements to link to RSS feeds from your SQL Server instance. The table column definitions must match those exposed by CData Connect AI. You can use the Data Explorer in Connect AI to see the table definition.

Sample CREATE TABLE Statement

Execute a CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE SQL command to create the external table(s), using the collation and setting the LOCATION to three-part notation for the connection, catalog, and table. The statement to create an external table based on a RSS Latest News would look similar to the following.

CREATE EXTERNAL TABLE Latest News(
  Author COLLATE [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  Pubdate COLLATE [nvarchar](255) NULL,
  ...
) WITH ( 
  LOCATION='RSS1.RSS.Latest News',
  DATA_SOURCE=ConnectCloudInstance
);

Having created external tables for RSS in your SQL Server instance, you are now able to query local and remote data simultaneously. To get live data access to hundreds of SaaS, Big Data, and NoSQL sources directly from your SQL Server database, try CData Connect AI today!